5 Expert Ways to Highlight Your Business’s Certifications and Expertise

Building trust with your site visitors requires effort and precision. The average person landing on your page may not have heard of you. They have no reason to trust you, so you have to prove you’re trustworthy. Some factors are a no-brainer, such as adding contact information. However, there are other things you can do to establish authority and show off your commendations.

Around 67% of adults around the globe claim they believe corruption is widespread in the business world. If the majority of people already feel businesses are untrustworthy, gaining their faith requires deliberate effort.

You’ve worked hard to create a positive customer experience and gain specific expertise in your field. Now, you get to show off those efforts and up your trustworthiness in the process. Here are five simple methods to highlight your best endorsements.

1. Focus on Proud Moments

Perhaps you don’t have a lot of awards from your industry yet, but you’re proud of what you’ve achieved as a brand. Whether it is a consumer-nomination for best service or you’ve overcome a substantial obstacle, share your achievements with site visitors. It shows you understand your limitations as a smaller brand. At the same time, you get that hard work pays off. This information alone can indicate you’re worthy of trust.

Accuweather does an excellent job of integrating their best achievements into their About section. They offer an achievements page with a timeline of big moments. Sometimes, success is just reaching a certain number of viewers or a personal goal they met. At other times, it is an award or accolade. The page is a nice mix of different highlights of the business.

2. Utilize Your Footer

When looking for certifications, people naturally head to the bottom of your page. Traditionally, this is where memberships, awards and certifications appeared. It’s also an excellent way to utilize the footer on your page as a last effort to show why the person should do business with you before they bounce. You can include other trust factors in this area, such as contact information and social media links.

York PMH uses the footer area to highlight some of their top certifications in the industry. Not only are they ISO certified and ITAR registered, but they also list elements, such as an outstanding performance award, for their machining and hydraulics.

3. Include Info in Your Tagline

You can also add certification or award info right in the branding of your company by stating any kudos you’ve received. You might say you were rated the number one restaurant in your town for the fifth year in a row. Perhaps you might indicate a certification if it’s one people would recognize readily. Keep in mind the mindset of your audience. They want you to solve a problem for them, so you need to show them why you’re capable of achieving a solution.

Parker & Sons uses their subheading to highlight their achievements. Their homepage features their logo, then the first heading on the page reads, “Voted # 1 Service Company by Ranking Arizona for the Past 7 Years!” They even use the opportunity to encourage their customers to keep voting for them.

4. Create Your Own Accolades

Perhaps your business doesn’t require certification and you’ve not received any awards. You can create your own hallmark moments by looking at what makes your company special. Why do you stand out from the other shops similar to yours? Perhaps you’ve been in business for several generations, have a unique product no one else does or you hit a personal goal.

Think outside the box when coming up with something interesting to share. You could also seek out certifications that might not be required but relate to your industry. For example, if you offer office support, you could encourage employees to get Microsoft certifications. Paperwork shows you went out on your own and invested in your knowledge, even though you’re not required to do so.

Don Hall’s restaurant is known for their hamburgers. However, that doesn’t set them apart—there are plenty of famous hamburger joints in nearly every state. What does make them unique is the fact that they’ve operated for over 74 years. Notice how they feature the year the business opened along with their logo, showing how proud they are of this accomplishment.

5. Explain Your Certifications

Your industry may be under regulations that require you to get certified, or perhaps industry standards call for certain training. Education is an example of an industry where teachers must put in so many hours of training each year to keep their licenses. However, there are many other industries that either require or suggest this step to stay up-to-date on the latest practices.

To your customers, the certifications may not mean all that much. They may not realize the significance of the training or what exactly you gained from finishing the task. It’s your job to educate them. Explain what each one is for and how it impacts them directly.

ECS provides IT solutions and systems engineering. They have an entire page devoted to the certifications they hold under their “About” tab. Note how each certification is explained briefly for those who might not know what the credentials mean. They start by explaining why they hold these certifications and how it ties into their philosophy for quality assurance. They then briefly explain the importance of each one.

Build Trust Through Your Business’s Certifications and Expertise

Be upfront and honest about your awards and certifications. If you don’t have any, focus on what you have accomplished. You may also want to use heat maps to determine the best placement for trust factors. Users typically skim over them rather than lingering. You want to build trust but keep the focus on the calls-to-action (CTAs) on your pages.